Glances
by Moony8193
Summary: How can he explain to her, his natural born enemy, how frightened he is to be here, tonight in the moon’s mysterious glow, how vulnerable and weak he feels? He doesn’t know how to make her understand what she does to him with a single glance. HxD


**Disclaimer: **I once had a dream I owned Harry Potter. Sadly, I woke up after about four hours and realised, "Hey! I DON'T own Harry Potter! Neither does three billion other people! What a small world!"

For Sammm, my secret bff and amazinggg friend. How could we naht bond being tortured in Mrs. B's english class?! Here's the Hermione/Draco you so desired. Love you.

* * *

It's odd isn't it? How moonlight changes everything. Makes the dreariest night glow. Turns rotted iron and dull gold into gleaming adventures, not whisperings of past glories. Burns hatred and social class into inexistence; in the vast darkness of night, we are all nothing.

He catches a flash of brown around the corner, and he speeds up his loping pace; he has the grace of a predator in the moonlit corridors, and like any prey, she flees beneath the unforgiving armor and classrooms, through uncharted territory, into the depths of the castle both predator and prey love.

Soon they round to the Great Hall; in full view now, the slender brunette whips down the stairs, her long robes and slippered feet pattering against the floor like rain. _Pat pat pat. Pat pat pat pat. _

He follows silently, flowing down the stairs with inhuman grace. Her breath catches, and she whirls to face him. Tremors shake her body, but she stands resiliently, feet apart. Reluctantly, the predator faces the prey, arms crossed, leaning against the marble banister. His blonde hair shines in the darkness.

The silence is deafening. He can feel it in his bones, in the ground. He hopes she won't flee again.

She breaks the quiet.

"_Leave me alone."_

He flinches at the force in her voice. It shivers in the air, pulsating and vibrating with sheer will. He fights to keep his trademark smirk in place.

"_Relax, Granger. We just need to talk." _

"_About what?"_ she snaps viciously. _"You're unbelievable, Malfoy. You didn't throw enough low shots during the day, so now you're stalking me at night?"_ her voice cracks, echoes in the silence of the entrance hall, but she wipes away the tears angrily, refusing to be weak.

He hesitates, unsure of where to begin, his smile trembling like a mirage and showing the true confusion underneath.

"_It's…it's not like that, honest."_ It sounds pleading and pathetic to his own critical ears, and he flinches in defeat.

The prey stares defiantly into the predator's gaze, clearly not accepting such an answer.

"_Hermione,"_ he whispers beseechingly, stepping forward warily.

She holds her ground, but in the moonlight, the fear is evident in her eyes.

"_What do you want, Malfoy?"_ she asks tiredly.

His smirk falls away, and he stands there, unsure and alone. Because he's not very sure of what he wants. How can he explain to her, his natural born enemy, how frightened he is to be here, tonight in the moon's mysterious glow, how vulnerable and weak he feels? He doesn't know how to make her understand what she does to him with a single glance.

She leaves him breathless with a glare, leaves him swelling with a longing he isn't sure how to control, knows shouldn't be there. How does he tell her that the smiles she awards so generously to Potter fill him up with such dark jealousy he fears he shall burst? And there's no possible way to describe his sleepless nights dreaming of her wide, brown eyes. Dreaming that maybe, one day, she'll give him the smile he's wanted for so long.

How does the predator tell the prey he's fallen in love with her?

He rubs his eyes, paws at his hair, and sighs.

"_I love you." _

She looks off-balanced and shocked, and he has to suppress a grin that for once, the know-it-all is stumped.

"_W-w-w-what?"_ she stutters, trembling fiercely, _"Well, I don't love you, you're rude and mean and…and…."_ Her voice trails off pathetically, and his heart soars at her feeble protests.

In three swift steps he sweeps her in his arms and holds her close, close enough to hear her heartbeat and gaze into her beautiful eyes.

She squirms in his grasp, but before she can even utter her demands and protests, he covers her lips with his own. He kisses her in the moonlight, in the dark that equals all advantages.

She pulls up blushing, embarrassed to find herself on tiptoe and so eager for more. She tries to straighten herself up, but he won't let her because he wants to see her smile, just for him, just once.

"_This is…different,"_ she allows with a tiny, shaky smirk.

Idly he wonders if she's copying him.

"_Very,"_ the predator agrees thoroughly, his arms still around her waist.

"_It's…very wrong, this 'you liking me' thing,"_ the prey says, scrunching her face as if savoring the words, trying to figure out if she likes them.

"_No one is more ashamed about it than yours truly," _he reminds with fervent embarrassment.

She nods and lets her head fall softly against his strong chest.

"_It's so wrong I think it just might be right,"_ she whispers shyly, smiling up at him in the glance he needed, thirsted for.

He covers her forehead, her nose and cheeks, in kisses, squeezing her tightly in a move so un-Malfoy-ish, so anti-Draco, Crabbe and Goyle and most likely Ron and Harry would all die from shock.

And she giggles in a way so non-Hermione, so un-know-it-all, Harry and Ron and Crabbe and Goyle would all be resurrected and then promptly die from shock again.

It's so wrong, so against all standards of nature for them to ever be together. The Mud-blood and the Pure Blood. The Gryffindor and the Slytherin. The rule worshipper and the rule breaker.

Then again, they've always defied the odds.

"_You have to explain how it happened,"_ she commands sleepily, placing her slippered feet on his sneakers as he begins to softly lead them through a dance.

He smiles as he twirls her, like James once twirled Lily in the Astronomy Towers, like Salazar once twirled Rowena in the dark of this very hall before she returned to bed with Godric.

"It all started with a glance," he begins musically, mysteriously, like the moonlight that brought them together.

* * *

Like it? Hate it? Love it? Adore it?

-danielle


End file.
